


A Week, Next Saturday

by brickhousewriter



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Capsicle, Complete, F/M, Steve Rogers is a self-rescuing princess, not a fix-it fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-21
Updated: 2015-12-21
Packaged: 2018-05-07 19:46:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 21,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5468702
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brickhousewriter/pseuds/brickhousewriter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Peggy Carter made a date with Steve Rogers for Saturday night at 8:00 o’clock at the Stork Club.  Peggy had told him, “Don’t you <i>dare</i> be late.”  Steve does everything in his power to make sure he keeps that date with Peggy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue - The Crash

**Author's Note:**

> This is not a fixit fic, no matter how much you may want it to be. 
> 
> I’m writing about a bunch of stuff I don’t know about, so any mistakes I make about geography, WWII history, military protocol, etc. you can blame on me and my two buddies, Google and Wikipedia. I’m just making this up as I go along…

The battle was short, but fierce, as were most of the battles involving the elite tactical force known informally as the Howling Commandos. After Captain America had burst through the front gate of the compound on his motorcycle, the rest of the team had waited for his signal before charging into the base. They’d fought their way past machine guns and flame throwers, and had finally captured the Communications Center in the very heart of the HYDRA base. Once the Communications Center fell, and their leader Johann Schmidt had fled, the remaining HYDRA officers had no way of communicating with each other, and no chance of organizing any effective resistance against the flood of Allied troops overrunning the base. Now it was just a matter of rounding up the remaining soldiers that hadn’t yet gotten the word that they’d lost the battle and the Allies had captured another base.

While the rest of their team dealt with the mopping up, Agent Peggy Carter and Colonel Chester Phillips were discussing how to make sure the entire facility was secure and that any pockets of resistance had been found and dealt with. Private Jim Morita, their communications expert, was seated at the console, monitoring communications for any signs that HYRDA was planning to attempt to regroup and launch a counter-attack.

Suddenly, a familiar voice, speaking English, came over the speaker. “Come in, this is Captain Rogers, do you read me?”

“Captain Rogers, what is your location?” Morita asked.

Peggy rushed over to the microphone and pushed Jim out of the way. “Steve, is that you? Are you alright?” The last time she’d seen Captain Steve Rogers, he’d been clinging to the landing gear of Johann Schmidt’s bomber, trying to tear the door open so he could get inside the plane.

“Peggy, Schmidt’s dead.” Steve sounded breathless. Morita gave up his seat to Carter. She was Captain America’s handler, after all. She should be the one giving the orders here. And despite the fact that they’d both tried to be professional about it and hide their feelings from the team, all the Howling Commandos knew those two were sweet on each other.

“What about the plane?” Peggy’s mind was whirling, Steve was Army, not Air Force. All the members of their special ops team had at least basic pilot training, but that didn’t mean Steve could fly Schmidt’s enormous bomber. Especially not if it had been damaged.

“That’s a little bit harder to explain.”

“Give me your coordinates, I’ll find you a safe landing site.” Could Steve land the plane? Would it be better for him to crash it somewhere and parachute to safety? The two of them working together had always been able to figure out a solution to even the most challenging problems that Steve managed to get himself, and sometimes his unit, into.

Steve’s voice came back from the speaker, “There’s not going to be a safe landing. But I can try to force it down.”

So Steve had realized that he couldn’t land the plane by himself. Good, they were on the same page as usual. Now she just had to find somewhere for him to crash. But he needed to tell her where he was for her to be able to find him a crash site. Preferably one with a large body of water to land in.

Colonel Phillips shook his head sadly. He wasn’t one to dismiss youthful idealism, but he’d also been in the Army longer than both of these two had been alive and he knew a hopeless situation when it was staring him in the face. Peggy didn’t see behind her, where Phillips silently tapped Morita on the shoulder and pointed towards the door. Phillips followed Morita out, but hovered in the doorway where he could both listen discreetly and make sure that Agent Carter wasn’t disturbed in what would probably be her last conversation with Rogers.

“I’ll, I’ll get Howard on the line, he’ll know what to do.” Peggy knew she was grasping at straws now, she had no idea how she could locate Howard Stark while keeping Steve on the line.

“There’s not enough time. This thing’s moving too fast, and it’s heading for New York.” Steve’s hometown. He spoke of it often. “I gotta put her in the water.”

“Please don’t do this. We have time. We can work it out.” The image of a scrawny Steve Rogers diving on a dummy hand grenade to rescue his fellow recruits suddenly flashed through her mind.

“Right now I’m in the middle of nowhere. If I wait any longer, a lot of people are gonna die.” Peggy bit her lip. She could feel tears welling up. He sounded just like the young kid from Brooklyn that she knew he was, even though he no longer looked as young and vulnerable as he had when she’d first met him. It wasn’t just the serum, the past few months of war had aged him, given him a maturity and gravitas that he hadn’t had before. But every now and then, she was reminded of the awkward boy he’d been when she met him.

“Peggy, this is my choice.” Steve sounded certain now, more like Captain America the leader of the Howling Commandos, and less like the sickly, skinny kid that she’d met back at Camp Lehigh. She bit her lip harder, holding back the tears.

“Peggy?” Steve’s voice was soft, uncertain.

“I’m here.” She reassured him, glad that her voice didn’t betray her feelings. She’d worked hard to cultivate that strong, calm voice when she was on the radio, monitoring and directing missions for men that she might never see again.

“I’m gonna need a rain check on that dance.”

Peggy almost laughed at the absurdity of it all. She’d only just admitted to herself what she felt for Steve. How much she liked him, how much she relied on his smiling face and cheerful attitude to help her get through the lack of sleep and the bad food and the muck and blood that was wartime. With the war on, she hadn’t allowed herself to feel anything, but as one HYDRA base after another had fallen to their team, it had started to look more and more like this might be a fight they could actually win (especially now that the damned Americans had finally joined in the fight and they had more than just a single special forces team and handful of unofficial “advisors” from the Yanks). And she’d allowed herself just the tiniest luxury of hope. And occasionally, maybe once a week, on her rare days off, she’d allowed herself to start to imagine that she might actually have a future once the war was over. A future she’d secretly started to hope she might spend with Steven Rogers.

It had been hard not to admire his bravery and determination when he’d been a recruit. And once Dr. Erskine had given him the Super Soldier Serum, it had been impossible to ignore the fact that Steve had been transformed into a rather fine male specimen. All the ladies gossiped about him, speculating on who might catch his eye. And sighing with disappointment every time he missed when one of them was flirting with him. Peggy often felt like she was the only one who appreciated Roger more for what was on the inside rather than what was on the outside. To her, his heart was infinitely more beautiful than his body.

She’d been fighting her feelings for months, and had finally given into the urge to kiss Steve.

She still couldn’t believe that she’d done that in front of Colonel Phillips. She was sure she’d hear about it later. But with the way things looked now, it was not a decision that she was going to have any regrets about.

“Alright.” She wiped a tear from her eye and steadied her voice. “A week, next Saturday. At the Stork Club.”

Steve’s voice came back firm and strong over the line. “You got it.”

Peggy used her command voice now, wishing that this was an order that Steve would be able to follow, “Eight o’clock on the dot. Don’t you _dare_ be late. Understood?”

This time Steve’s voice was less sure, almost bashful. “You know, I still don’t know how to dance.”

Peggy smiled despite the fact that her heart was breaking. “I’ll show you how. Just be there.” Please, please be there. Please find some way to ditch the plane. Please survive the crash the way you’ve survived every other impossible mission we’ve sent you on. Please Steve.

Steve was still talking. “We’ll have the band play something slow. I’d hate to step on your….”

The radio cut out.

“Steve?” Peggy thought they’d have more time, “Steve?”

There was nothing but static over the line.

“Steve? Steve?”

Peggy dropped her face in her hands and her control broke and the tears came in a hot flood.

Colonel Phillips quietly shut the door to the Communications Center. He waved over a soldier and informed him, “We need to make sure we keep any HYDRA agents away from the communications equipment. Agent Carter is in there keeping an eye on things for me. Nobody goes in or out, not without my explicit command, understood?”

“Yes sir!”


	2. Peggy's Story

Agent Peggy Carter allowed herself exactly five minutes to grieve over the loss of Steven Rogers. 

And then she pulled herself together, wiped the tears from her eyes with her handkerchief, and straightened her clothes and hair. After all, she was British, and she had a reputation to maintain in front of her men. They had expectations, and she needed to meet (or better yet exceed) them. And Captain Rogers hadn't been courting her. At least, not yet. She firmly squashed that line of thinking, she didn’t have time to indulge in wishful daydreams in the middle of what, to judge from the scattered gunfire she was hearing, was still an active battle. She quickly scanned the consoles in the Communications Center. She could see through the windows overlooking the massive underground warehouse and hanger bay that there were still pockets of HYDRA agents putting up resistance against the Allied troops. She could see flashes of their energy weapons, and here and there small explosions were still going off. She glanced at the video screens arrayed around the rooms. There were still sounds of battle coming through the various speakers in the room, guttural snippets of German, and she could track the movement of the Howling Commandos through the base on the video screens that hadn’t been damaged in the fighting.

Suddenly there was a burst of gunfire and something slammed against the closed door of the Communications Center. When had Colonel Phillips closed the door? No time to worry about what had happened to her superior officer, Peggy snatched up the machine gun from where she’d left it propped against the console, and headed towards the door to investigate.

***

Much, much later there was a tentative knock on the door of the Communications Center. “Peeeeeeggy?” Sergeant Timothy “Dum Dum” Dugan drew out her name until it was almost three syllables. “Everything alright in there with you?” He thought there were a couple more corpses in the hallway than the last time he’d walked down it, but he hadn’t taken a body count, so he couldn’t be sure.

“I’m fine Sergeant.” Peggy’s voice sounded calm, which didn’t make Dugan feel any better. Carter always sounded calm, even when the fecal matter was hitting the oscillating rotary blades. Dugan wasn't sure if it was that British accent, but she always sounded cool as a cucumber sandwich.

Dugan slowly snuck the barrel of his rifle around the edge of the door, closely followed by his head, topped with his signature bowler hat. Peggy Carter stood in the middle of the deserted Communications Center, cradling a HYDRA energy rifle in her arms. Dugan walked into the room, jerking a thumb over his shoulder, “I thought that Colonel Phillips said he left a guard posted for ya?”

“Yes, Private Wykowsky and I have just been getting to know one another.” Carter nodded towards the young man sitting on the floor propped up against the wall, eyes wide in his pale face, clutching his rifle across his chest, a bloody field bandage wrapped around his left thigh and secured with his belt.

“I see.” Dugan raised his eyebrows, then bellowed back over his shoulder towards the hallway, “We need a medic in here!” A man in an Army corpsman uniform pushed his way into the room. Peggy could see a few of the other Howling Commandos loitering in the corridor, quietly chatting with each other. So Colonel Phillips had sent the team back to fetch her? 

Dugan moved up beside her and gripped her shoulder as they watched the corpsman examine the private, “How about you Peggy? You OK?”

Peggy summoned a weak smile. “I’m quite alright Sergeant.”

“Any word yet from Cap?” Dugan said this in a much lower voice, making sure the private and the corpsman didn’t overhear.

“No, no, I’m afraid not.” Peggy whispered back, clenched her hands around the rifle even tighter, trying to maintain her composure.

“Well, he’ll turn up. He always does.” Dugan smiled shyly at her and patted her shoulder again. Peggy knew that Colonel Phillips must have told him about Steve’s last transmission. “We’re just about done mopping up here. Come on, I’ve got a bottle of hooch stashed in my gear. I’ll buy you a drink.” 

“Thank you Mr. Dugan, I think I could use a drink right about now.”

***

It was several more hours before she got that drink from Dugan. They had to finish flushing out the last of the last of the HYRA resistance first. And Peggy was busy supervising packing up the most valuable of the HYDRA tech to ship back to England and Howard Stark’s laboratory. It was late in the evening, possibly even early in the morning before they had a chance to sit down. And by that point they were strapped into seats along the sides of a Douglas C-54 SkyMaster, flying back to home base with a cargo hold stuffed full of captured gear. Dugan reached under his seat and pulled out his haversack and fished around before holding up a bottle. “How about that drink that I promised you?”

“Thank you Mr. Dugan, I could use one.” Peggy was exhausted and sore and just wanted to forget that this day had ever happened. But she was too worried about Steve to relax. A drink might help.

Dugan pried out the cork with his teeth, spat it into his hand, then handed the bottle to Carter with a nod. “Ladies first.”

Peggy nodded in return, then took a long pull on the bottle. It was whiskey, probably American, part of the rations that the US Army had just started sending over as part of their support for the war effort. Wheat had been rationed in Britain for too long for it to be anything he’d found locally. She felt it burn on the way down. Her voice was hoarse when she spoke. “Thank you Mr. Dugan, that goes down perfectly after an absolutely shit day.” She handed the bottle back to Dugan.

He took a long swig of his own, then offered the bottle back to her. Between the two of them, they finished it off during the long flight back to England. And nobody said a word while Peggy Carter got quietly pissed under the watchful eye of Dum Dum Dugan and finally fell asleep against his shoulder. When they landed late Sunday afternoon, Dugan and Falsworth commandeered a Jeep and escorted her back to her rented flat. They knocked on the door and handed their still-drunk Operations Supervisor over to her landlady, who asked “Is she hurt?” One or two of the residents of the boarding house stood at the top of the staircase, peeping over the railing at the two soldiers standing in the parlor.

“No, just stinking drunk I’m afraid.” Falsworth explained as he carefully lowered Peggy into a chair. “She needs a good kip. And maybe a hot water bottle tucked into bed with her.”

Private Lorraine came down the stairs. “What happened?” Dugan took her aside for a whispered conversation to explain that things had gone pear-shaped and Captain Rogers had gone missing and Carter had taken the news particularly hard. Lorraine nodded knowingly and then helped her coworker upstairs and to her room.

 **Monday**  
Despite her weekend’s adventures, Peggy reported to work early Monday morning, after a cold shower, because she’d had to report to work before her landlady had turned on the hot water for the day. Once she was in the office, she nursed her hangover with a bottle of aspirin and a brisk cup of piping hot tea before she reported for Colonel Phillips’s morning briefing.

She found the briefing room in the underground bunker than served as London headquarters for the Strategic Scientific Reserve and Allied Command more crowded than usual for a Monday morning briefing.

The Howling Commandos stood or sat in a loose circle around the map table in the center of the room. Sergeant Timothy “Dum Dum” Dugan, defiantly wearing his non-regulation bowler hat to the briefing, bent his head over the table, pretending to study the map. Corporal Montgomery Farnsworth, the team’s British demolitions expert chatted quietly with Private Jacques Dernier, their French demolitions expert. Both wore berets: Farnsworth because it was part of the uniform of his former unit, Dernier simply because he was French. Across the table from them, Private Jim Morita, the unit’s Nisei Army Ranger and communications expert, stood chatting quietly with Private Gabe Jones, the team’s African-American trilingual translator and marksman. Standing behind the Commandos were various officers and representatives of the various Allied commands.

Seated at the table were Colonel Chester Phillips, US Army, Director of the Strategic Scientific Reserve, and the overall commanding officer of the special operations team known as the Howling Commandos, Agent Peggy Carter, British Special Air Service, Great Britain’s liaison and advisor to the Strategic Scientific Reserve, and Howard Stark, inventor and industrialist, civilian engineering consultant to the SSR.

Phillips called everyone to order. “Gentlemen. This afternoon we will be releasing to the press the information that Captain America and the 107th Division have taken another HYDRA base and defeated the Red Skull’s plans to bomb several major American cities. MI7 is already working on the British and American press releases, as well as some propaganda to distribute to the Germans about this successful mission.” There was some polite clapping from the fringes of the room.

“However, the rest of what I’m about to tell you today is classified, understood?” Every head in the room nodded. “Anyone not in this room, no matter what their rank, is not privy to what I’m about to say. Are we clear?”

There was a chorus of “Yes sir!” from around the room.

“In the course of stopping Johann Schmidt’s plan to bomb major American cities, Captain Steven Rogers has gone missing. His current status is now MIA.”

There were a few quiet gasps from around the room. Peggy took a deep breath and gripped her pen tighter to help her get through the next part of the briefing. Luckily, Private Lorraine had been assigned to take the meeting notes today, and all she had to do was listen to the briefing.

“But sir, Captain Rogers has gone missing before!”

“Yeah, he was out of touch with us for three days one time, then he turned up with all you blokes.” The speaker gestured around the room at all the Howling Commandos.

“That’s true gentlemen. But this time, Captain Rogers was on board an armed HYDRA bomber that was carrying a full load of ordinance. That he was forced to crash land before it reached its target. We have to assume that when the plane went down, the bombs she was carrying could have detonated and that Captain Rogers may have been killed in action.” Colonel Phillips sighed. It pained him to lose Rogers, he’d been a valuable asset.

“But we don’t know for sure, do we sir?”

“No, we do not. But there has been no confirmed word from Captain Rogers since we lost contact with him Saturday at approximately 1500 hours. Unfortunately, we did not have a lock on his position at the time, and we have no idea where his plane went down. The only good news is that there have been no confirmed reports of any large unexplained explosions anywhere in the Atlantic. But considering the size of the area where he might have been, that’s very little chance that anyone would have been around to witness the crash.”

“Are we allowed to search for him sir?”

“If the Nazis find out that Captain America is missing, it just might give them ideas. And we can’t afford that right now. Not when we’re so close to launching our next offensive. So for the time being, if anyone asks you about the whereabouts of Captain America, he’s on a secret mission, and you’re not at liberty to talk about it.”

“Yes sir.”

Dugan and Stark exchanged a look. They understood each other perfectly. The Colonel hadn’t said “No.”

“Now, MI1 has been working hard decrypting the data that we’ve captured in this latest raid, and we think we’ve located the last of the HYDRA bases that we know about in Europe….”

***

After the meeting, Peggy rinsed out her mug in the kitchenette and made herself another cup of tea before retreating to her tiny cramped office in the bowels of the building. When the Germans started bombing London, almost all critical military operations had moved underground. When she wasn’t working in a bunker buried under the turf at Reading AFB, she was working in a sub-sub-basement in an undisclosed location somewhere near Whitehall.

Her space was tiny, it was dingy (she was too far underground to have anything even remotely resembling a window) and it was cramped. Her office was barely a closet, there was room for her desk and chair, and when she had visitors, they could either stand in the doorway or sit on top of the short filing cabinet. And that was only if it wasn’t completely covered with files and other bumf, as was often the case. Her coat, hat, handbag, and gas mask hung on a row of pegs on the wall behind her head. Her pistol went in the bottom drawer, right on top of the framed picture of Captain America that she kept hidden out of sight.

Sitting in her office, a steaming mug of tea warming her hands, she looked at the scrape on her hand that she hadn’t even realized she’d gotten last night. And she realized that surviving the mission to capture the last HYDRA base had been the easy part. She’d had her team to help her with that.

Now she had to start figuring out how to go on living life without Steve Rogers in it. And that was something she was going to have to figure out all on her own.

 **Tuesday**  
Agent Peggy Carter looked up from the briefing she was reading as a large stack of file folders thumped down on her desk. Howard Stark smiled down at her as Sergeant Dugan dropped a second, equally imposing, stack of folders next to the first one.

“What’s all this?” she asked. She thought she’d had a handle on all the after-action reports, requisitions, and other paperwork assigned to her after their last mission.

“Field reports from the Royal Observer Corps. Figured if there was any chance that anyone saw which direction Steve was headed in Schmidt’s bomber, it would be the ROC.” Stark’s grin widened. He was clearly pleased with his idea.

“Brilliant idea Howard.” Peggy acknowledged his genius, because that was how you got along with Howard Stark, by patting him on the head and telling him he was a smart boy. Especially when he so clearly wanted praise for his idea. “But I thought Colonel Phillips said we weren’t to search for Captain Rogers?” Inwardly Peggy sighed to herself, because if there was one thing she was dying to do right now, it was launch a search for Steven Rogers.

“No, in fact, Colonel Phillips did _not_ say that we couldn’t search for Captain Rogers. In fact, I very distinctly did not hear him say anything that would forbid us from conducting a search. And as a result, we have decided to search.” Stark’s logic was circuitous some days, but his ideas usually made good sense.

“And you know how we are Peggy, we’ll take a lack of ‘No’ as a ‘Yes’ any day.” Dugan grinned at her and winked. 

Peggy pursed her lips at the two of them. It was true, she’d also noticed that Colonel Phillips had failed to explicitly forbid his men to search for Rogers. And she knew that, on occasion, the Colonel had turned a blind eye on those instances when the Howling Commandos had chosen to ask for forgiveness after the fact rather than ask for permission before they committed some act that they weren’t quite sure he would approve of. But she couldn’t start making a habit of circumventing her superior officer’s wishes. Except… was she sure that she even knew what his wishes were in this case?

Now she was starting to sound like the two men standing in front of her, grinning, waiting for her to do something. 

Peggy waved at the two stacks of folders on her desk, “And what exactly do you expect me to do with all of these, gentlemen?”

“Well,” Howard said, making himself comfortable on the corner of her desk while Dugan leaned against the doorframe of her small office, “I was thinking we could have some of the gals in the typing pool read through these and see if they can turn up anything that might point to Rogers. I’d have my own girls do it, but they’re not cleared for official secrets. And I’m pretty sure that Phillips would have my hide if I had those ladies start reading through Official Government Documents.” Peggy could hear the capital letters in his voice as he spoke. “We were thinking that we should put out the word, without letting on that he’s actually missing, that the Observer Corps should keep an eye out for Rogers. We can tell them that on his last mission he had to take a different route back to base, and we lost contact before he told us when and where to expect him.”

“What would Colonel Phillips say about that?” Peggy thought it was a brilliant idea, as were most of the schemes that Stark thought up, but it wasn’t her call to make.

Dugan spoke up, “Oh, we ran the idea past him before we did anything.”

“And did he approve of your plan?”

“He harrumphed and chewed on the end of his cigar and threw us out of his office.” Dugan admitted, still smiling.

“But he didn’t say no!” Howard pointed at Dugan.

“Nope, he sure didn’t.” Dugan pointed back at Howard. “So here we are, darkening your doorway.” He turned his most charming smile on Peggy. She’d seen it before. Every time he tried to wheedle a favor out of her.

Peggy sighed. “And you want me to draft this memo to the Royal Observer Corps?”

“I knew you’d catch on!” Howard leaned over and kissed the top of her head. “You’re a bright girl Peggy, you’ll go far. We should include the Royal Air Force in the first memo. Oh, and we should probably draft a separate memo for the US Coast Guard and the Civil Air Patrol. We don’t know how far Rogers got before he went down. He could be closer to the States than he is to Europe for all we know.” He stood up. “Let us know when it’s ready to send out, I can have my people deliver it.” He tapped the stack of folders with his finger. “We’ll find him, I promise you that.”

Peggy closed the folder in front of her and pulled a stenographer’s notebook out of her desk drawer. “Give me an hour, I’ll have the memos for you before lunch.” 

***

When Peggy went to the canteen for something to eat she scanned the crowded lunchroom for signs of any of her team. She spotted them and wove through the crowd, where Sergeant Dugan picked his hat up off the chair and Corporal Falsworth shoved it away from the table with his foot. It was as close to polite as the men ever got with her, but it warmed her heart nonetheless that they’d obviously saved her a seat at their table.

She sat down and took a bite from her sandwich before she asked, “Any news?”

Nobody needed clarification as to what she was asking about.

Jim Morita had been monitoring communications all morning. He was plowing his way through his lunch of “meat” pie and mushy peas. He finished chewing and swallowed before he answered her.

“Two bodies washed ashore last night in Scotland. We’ve already checked the first one, it was a fisherman, been missing for three days.”

“And the second?” She felt her mouth go dry around the mouthful of National Loaf and Spam she was chewing on.

“Still waiting for a call back about the second one. All I know is that the report says it’s a big man.” He frowned, sorry to be the bearer of possibly bad news.

Peggy choked down another bite of her sandwich before she spoke again. “Well, keep me informed.”

“You’ll be the first one to know.” He nodded at her, then shoveled more peas in his mouth.

Just then Private Gabe Jones joined them. “Just got word.” He plunked down in an empty chair. “The second Scottish body was wearing a HYDRA uniform, probably one of Schmidt’s pilots. We’ll know more when it arrives at the morgue later today.”

Peggy swallowed the lump in her throat and reached for her cup of tea. 

There was still hope.

 **Thursday**  
“Agent, might I have a word?”

Agent Carter looked up at the knock on her doorframe. Colonel Phillips stood in the doorway to her small office. It was the first time she’d been in the same room as her superior officer since the Monday morning briefing three days ago.

“Yes sir.” Carter put down the most recent field reports from the Royal Observer Corps and turned her attention to the Colonel.

“I hate to do this to you Carter, but Rogers has been AWOL for five days and there’s been no word…” Phillips voice trailed off and he looked uncomfortable.

Carter swallowed, her mouth suddenly gone dry. “I understand sir. How do you want to proceed sir?”

“There’s still a war on, and I haven’t got the manpower to spare to keep looking for Rogers. Even if I’d like to keep looking, I can’t.” Phillips nodded to her, briefly acknowledging everything that they’d both lost when Captain Rogers went down. “I’m officially declaring him MIA probably KIA. We’ll keep this out of the press as long as we can. But we’ve got a job to do, and he wouldn’t want us to stop working just because of him.”

“No sir, I mean yes sir.” Carter swallowed hard. “What about the ROC reports?” She waved at the piles of folders that had taken over her desk in the past several days.

“As much as I appreciate Stark’s idea, I need you working with me. I can’t spare you for the search anymore. Tell ‘em to only forward a report to us if there’s something actually worth flagging. We haven’t got time to sift through every single observer’s imaginary heroics.” Agent Carter realized that Colonel Phillips must have at least looked at a couple of the reports to have been able to so accurately sum up what she’d been dealing with for days. Every aged, infirm, or otherwise unfit for duty male seemed to have volunteered for the Royal Observation Corps. And they all seemed to take great delight in inventing personal acts of bravery and near misses with unidentified (but surely Nazi) objects and suspects in their weekly reports.

“Yes sir.” Carter was almost relieved. As much as she wanted to find Steve, she didn’t want to spent any more time than she had to reading through these dreadful reports.

“Good, we’ve got a war to win. It’s time we got back to it.”

Before he could leave, Carter called him back, “Colonel Phillips, sir?”

“What?”

“What about Captain Roger’s team?”

Phillips stuck his head back in the door, “What about them?”

“Who is going to lead them now? Or will they be disbanded?” Peggy hoped the Howling Commandos would not be disbanded. Many of the fellows had become good friends over the months of working closely together.

“I hadn’t thought about that yet.” Phillips frowned, but just for a moment, thinking out loud, “They’re a good team, work well together. Seems to make sense to keep them together until this whole thing is over. I’ve got plenty of work for them to do. We can keep ‘em busy.”

“Who will lead them now?”

“I dunno. Why don’t you ask them who they want to lead them?” And Phillips stalked off towards his own office.

***

Peggy walked the warren of basement corridors until she came to the large room where she could usually find the senior members of the Howling Commandos. Dugan was bent over a table pointing out something on a map to Morita. Falsworth and Dernier were in a corner next to a pile of fuses, having a heated argument in a mix of English and French. And Jones, Sawyer, and Juniper were disassembling and cleaning guns at a table in another corner.

Peggy stood in the doorway until they’d all noticed her and the room grew silent. “I’m afraid I have bad news boys.”

“They found Steve’s body?” Leave it to Dernier to speak the unspeakable.

“No, but Colonel Phillips has officially declared him MIA probably KIA. We’ll keep it out of the papers for now, but he’s calling off the search.”

“What happens to us?” Pinky Pinkerton wanted to know. He was a new addition of the team, and still enjoying the thrill of joining such an elite squadron.

“I asked Colonel Phillips that very question. He says that the team will be kept together. He’s still got work for you to do. But my question for you is this. In Captain Roger’s absence, who do you want to lead you?”

There was silence as the men looked at each other. Finally Dugan spoke. “Can we get back to you on that Peggy?”

“Yes. Although I’m sure Colonel Phillips would like an answer as soon as possible.”

 **Friday**  
The next day Phillips started their briefing by asking who was going to lead the Howling Commandos.

Sergeant Dugan answered him. “We’ve talked it over sir, and the men want me to lead them.”

Phillips nodded his approval, “Makes sense, since you’re the ranking officer.”

“Yes sir. But we’d like one other thing sir.” Dugan smiled.

“What’s that Sergeant?”

“Well sir, we’d still like Peggy, I mean Agent Carter to act as our liaison.”

Peggy felt a warm rush of gratitude towards the Sergeant and the rest of the team for thinking to request her.

“You sure Sergeant?” Phillips frowned, “You won’t have any trouble taking orders from a woman?” Colonel Phillips looked over at her, but his eyes were twinkling, and Peggy could tell that the frown was just for show. Phillips approved of the team’s request. He was just asking for the benefit of the senior officers from other divisions who were in the room, and would certainly raise objections if Phillips hadn’t already raised the point.

“Yes sir. Captain Rogers was happy taking orders from her, and that’s good enough for the rest of us.” The rest of the team gave a chorus of “Yes sir.” “Cap followed orders from her.” “She was good enough for Captain America, and that’s good enough for us.”

Peggy tried not to smile, but it was such a relief to know that she would still be working with the team. She hadn’t realized how much she’d dreaded losing them too until the weight of that fear was lifted off her shoulders. 

“Besides, Carter always makes sure we’ve got plenty of intel.” Gabe said.

“And explosives!” Falsworth and Dernier spoke at almost the same time

“And bullets.” Junior Juniper added.

“And beer!” Dugan chimed in, “No wait, that’s me, not Carter. Sorry ‘bout that.” And everyone around the table laughed and it was almost like old times. 

Except that Steve wasn’t there. 

Peggy smiled at them all through watery eyes, and thanked them for their confidence in her. And then Colonel Phillips started briefing them on their next mission, based on intel that they’d decoded from the last HYDRA base that they’d captured.

 **Saturday**  
Saturday morning Peggy Carter woke up early. It was her one day off that fortnight, by all rights she should have been able to have a good lie-in, but her body was awake at 0500 hours, just like every morning. She sighed and threw back the covers. Might as well start her day.

There was a line for the showers, but that was to be expected, with the coal rationing affecting how long the landlady could run the boiler every day. Hot water was rationed like everything else that made life livable and civilized, tea, soap, sweets and chocolate. Peggy lined up with the other girls who shared the boarding house. Luckily, she was early enough in the queue that there was still hot water by the time her turn came. Peggy washed her hair quickly, before the water had a chance to turn icy, then walked back down the hall to her room, wet hair wrapped in a towel. She carefully set her hair in rag curlers, then wrapped a cotton scarf around her head in a turban. 

She popped down to the dining room and had a quick breakfast of tea and toast. She was still too worried about Steve to have much of an appetite.

While she waited for her hair to dry, she hauled her blouses and knickers down to the basement laundry room and washed out her things in a tub of cold water. Back in her room she hung everything up on a line stretched diagonally across the room between the window and the doorframe. It was a gorgeous, sunny day, so she threw open the curtains and opened the window to air out her room. 

Since she had time, she did her nails. She stripped off the old polish, soaked her hands, and rubbed cream on them. As she picked through her dwindling collection of nail polish bottles, Peggy reflected that this was just another small luxury that the war had taken away from them. She finally settled on a color, a fiery red, and hoped there was enough left in the bottle to do all ten nails.

She sat in the window and watched the people go by as her nails dried. Men and women and children, all going about their business. But never able to forget that it was wartime, as they almost all carried gas masks with them. Even the babies in their carriages had either gas masks or special covers for their pram. London still hadn’t recovered from the Blitz, it would probably take years to rebuild once the Germans stopped bombing. And they had to stop first.

Peggy sighed and blew lightly on her nails. Once she was sure they were dry, she opened up her briefcase and pulled out the pile of briefings. She’d spent too much time reading ROC reports this past week, she was behind on her regular work. She spent a couple of hours, perched in the wide window sill with a pillow, breathing the fresh air while she worked her way through the pile of reports she should have read days ago. Luckily, there wasn’t anything time sensitive that she’d missed. She made a few notes to herself, things to point out to Colonel Phillips when she got back into the office.

Then she tried to read a novel to get her mind off the war. But she couldn’t concentrate on it. She picked through the small collection of books next to her bed, but she couldn’t find anything she hadn’t already read three times. She couldn’t stop thinking about Steve and wondering if he was alright. And would she ever see him again? Finally she heard some of the other girls out in the hallway and stuck her head out to see if any of them felt like taking a walk. Three of them were going to the movies, so she went along with them to the cinema, and was able to forget her worries for a few hours watching newsreels and cartoons and a Hollywood musical.

After the movies Peggy visited her local grocer to pick up her weekly ration of 2 oz of tea and 8 oz of sugar. She ate most of her meals at the canteen at work, but she didn’t want to not use her ration coupons and miss out on the chance to have a cup of tea when she was home. When she got back to the boarding house, she made herself a strong cup of tea and sat back in the window. As she sipped it, she considered the events of the past week. She finally sighed and decided that yes, even though she didn’t really have a reason, because there’d been no word, she still had hope. She was going to go to the Stork Club and pray for a miracle.

She checked her stockings, they were almost dry. She moved them closer to the window, into the sunlight to help them along. Then she ironed her uniform blouses for the next week and brushed her uniform and polished her shoes. Then she pulled out her red dress. True, Steve had seen it before, but she had a very limited number of frocks to choose from. And she still remembered the way Captain Roger’s friend, Sergeant Barnes’s mouth had practically dropped open when she’d walked into the bar looking for him that night. She could have worn her uniform when she tracked him down with the news about forming a special unit. But she’d been feeling low, and decided that what she needed was a night on the town with the girls from the boarding house. That was before she got the phone call from Colonel Phillips.

Peggy pressed the dress, careful not to get the iron too hot. She took her time getting dressed. She chose her newest bra and knickers, and carefully checked over her stockings for ladders before sliding them up her legs. She slid into the red dress and checked her reflection in the mirror. She’d lost some more weight due to the wartime rationing, but she still had curves, and the satin neckline showed off a creamy expanse of skin. 

She took the rag curlers out of her hair and brushed out her dark waves. She took particular care on her makeup, curling her lashes and lining her lips in a deep red that matched her nail polish. When she was finally ready, she called a cab and told the driver to take her to the Stork Club.

 **The Stork Club**  
Agent Carter checked her watch. It was 10:05, five minutes since the last time she checked. She sighed and toyed with her bag again. She looked at her glass sweating itself a small puddle on the table, then back at the door. Steve was two hours late. If she was being honest with herself, he was a week late. They hadn’t heard a single word from him since he put Schmidt’s plane into the water somewhere along the flight path to New York City, seven days ago. She wasn’t entirely sure why she was even sitting here, at the Stork Club, waiting for him to keep the date that they’d made while Johann Schmidt’s plane hurtled towards the Earth in a controlled dive. Except that she had faith. Faith that she’d somehow see Steve Roger’s smiling face again.

She could still remember the first time she’d given up hope on Rogers, and he’d proved her wrong. He’d jumped out of Howard Stark’s plane 30 miles behind enemy lines, to go search for his friend Sergeant Barnes. She’d waited for word from him for three days before she’d finally gone to Colonel Phillips and confessed that Rogers wasn’t AWOL, he was MIA probably KIA. Phillips had ripped her a new arsehole and threatened to have her stripped of rank. She’d taken the dressing down, because she knew he was right. She hadn’t had any right to do what she’d done. Except that she believed that Steve was being wasted dancing with showgirls. Doctor Erskine had not chosen him for the Super Soldier serum because of his dance skills, as he had none. Erskine had chosen him because Steve wanted so desperately to fight and to make a contribution towards the war effort that he’d tried to enlist five times. And Peggy truly believed that all that muscle and heart and intelligence and will to serve had been wasted selling war bonds. If she’d finally given Rogers the opportunity to die doing what he’d signed up to do, then she’d take the reduction in rank, because it was what Steve deserved.

Only Rogers hadn’t died. Just as Colonel Phillips had started winding down from his tirade, there had been a commotion outside. And Steve Rogers had marched into camp at the head of a column of three hundred men and so much liberated HYDRA technology that it had made Howard Stark nearly swoon when he saw it. Rogers had tried to surrender himself for disciplinary action. Colonel Phillips had said that wouldn’t be necessary. Later, when Peggy had inquired with the Colonel about whether she should change the rank on her uniforms, he’d snarled at her that she could keep her damned rank. But he was assigning her to be Roger’s handler. And he hoped that would be punishment enough.

It had been. Over the next several months she’d spent more time worrying about Steve and his handpicked collection of rule breaking, bomb making, ass kicking soldiers than she had any right to. But they weren’t just Steven’s chosen brothers-in-arms, they were hers too. After Steve had given her his list of names, she’d personally vetted ever one of the men he’d chosen to join the Howling Commandos. And had been pleasantly surprised that not a single one of the men gave her any gruff about being their handler and liaison officer, at least not more than once. Once Captain America took an order from “a dame” all the rest of the Commandos fell in line and followed suit. Peggy secretly thought that Steve might have had a quiet “talk” with one or two of them, but she’d never questioned the occasional black eye on a new recruit, or a sudden change of attitude towards her from a soldier. And eventually, even the troublesome ones had slowly become good friends.

She’d loved them all like brothers: fussing over their wounds, meditating the occasional dispute, listening to their secrets, looking the other way when the situation required it. She hadn’t meant to develop feelings for any of them, and she certainly hadn’t meant to fall in love with Steve Rogers. She wasn’t even sure when it had happened. It was hard not to like Steve. He’d quickly become her favorite when she’d been evaluating the candidates for Operation Rebirth, but she’d put that down to rooting for the underdog. And it was hard to ignore the astonishing physical transformation he’d undergone during his procedure, even though she’d seen her share of fine physical specimens during her time as an RAF nurse. But somewhere along the way they’d become friends. And the fact that Steve adored her was hard to ignore, but ignore it she must, if they were to continue on with her working as his handler.

But she was sure that he’d almost kissed her in the HYDRA base. There had been that awkward moment. They’d practically bumped into each other during the battle, and Steve had just stood there looking at her. She’d stood there frozen, not sure if she should allow this to happen. Then she’d seen a platoon of troops jogging by over his shoulder and she’d remembered they weren’t alone, they were in the middle of a battle for the base. She’d reminded him of where they were, and Steve had blinked a couple of times before he dashed off to rejoin the fight.

She tried not to think about the fact that she’d broken her vow to herself not to get involved with any of the men working under her when she’d kissed him. She had no regrets over that kiss, but Steve’s disappearance made it too soon to pull that memory out and roll it over in her mind. No, she wouldn’t think about that now. 

She picked up the glass and tossed back the last of the melted ice. It only tasted faintly of the whiskey she’d been nursing all night while she waited. Putting the glass back on the table she sighed quietly and decided it was time to face reality. As much as she wanted to see him again, Steve wasn’t coming back. She’d been trying to deny it for the past week, but she had to face the facts. He wasn’t ever coming back. She picked up her bag and stood up, turning quickly she walked right into someone behind her. 

The man caught her in his arms as they collided. He smelled of whiskey and soap and his arms were strong as they steadied her. “Ohh, I’m sorry Ma’am.” He stepped back, then looked down at her and a shy grin broke out across his familiar face.


	3. Steve's Story

**Day One**

Steve Rogers woke up with a pounding headache. Which was strange, because after he’d been given the Super Soldier serum, he didn’t get headaches anymore. He didn’t know where he was or what had happened. He tried to listen, to see if his ears could give his fuzzy brain any clues as to what happened to him, but all he could hear was the hammering of his own pulse against his skull. Steve slowly opened his eyes, but he couldn’t see anything. Wherever he was, it was pitch black.

He started to sit up, but his head swam and everything seemed to tilt. He stopped moving, waiting for the spinning to calm down, glad for the moment that he couldn’t see anything. He’d been in enough fights by now to know that loss of consciousness followed by nausea meant that he probably had a concussion. But since he’d gotten the Super Soldier serum, his body healed faster than normal. He knew that if he just sat still for a bit, his body would adjust and his head would stop spinning so much. It was much better than when he was younger, when he’d had to put up with the spinning and nausea for days instead of minutes or hours. He stayed where he was, crouched over whatever he’d been lying on, until the spinning slowed down.

Once the initial wave of nausea passed, he finished sitting up. There was a tall chair behind his back. He carefully leaned his head back against the headrest and tried to remember what had happened. His head was still throbbing, and he couldn’t see anything in the dark, so he closed his eyes and tried to think. All he could concentrate on was the throb, throb, throb of his pulse against the front of his skull.

He reached up and felt his forehead. There was a sizeable goose-egg above his right eye. He ran his fingers over the bump, wondering how he got it. He was tired. And his head hurt. He sighed softly and settled back to wait for the miracle healing provided by the serum to kick in.

***

The second time he woke up his head had stopped pounding enough for him to realize that wherever he was, it was freezing cold.

Steve fumbled in the dark for the pouches on his belt. His hands were stiff with the cold, and felt numb inside his leather gloves. He flexed his hands, making a fist, hoping to pump warmer blood into his fingertips. It took a few minutes before he felt like his hands were starting to warm up. He reached for his belt again, and on the third try, managed to open the pocket he was looking for. He pulled out the small package, tore open the wrapper with his teeth, and bent the small tube that Stark had just issued them the week before.

As the two sides of the chemical flare met and mixed, light bloomed and Steve had to turn his head away and close his eyes until they could adjust. He shook his head slowly. It had stopped hurting now, but he still felt off balance. He wondered how long he’d been out this time? He cracked open his eyes and squinted, peering out into the darkness.

The dim glow from the tube in his hands revealed what looked like a cockpit. He was sitting in a pilot’s chair, in front of the controls of a plane. It all came back to him. Johann Schmidt. The raid on the HYDRA base. Schmidt trying to escape in the massive bomber. The glowing cube and Schmidt disappearing in a flash of light. The bombs on board, the plane still headed for America. His desperate efforts to stop the plane before it could destroy his hometown of New York City.

And the good luck kiss from Peggy.

He could still remember his surprise, when Peggy had called out “Wait” and grabbed one of the straps of his uniform, pulling him back into the car. Before he’d been able to ask what she was doing, she’d pressed her lips against his in a quick, sweet kiss. He could still feel her lips, warm and soft against his. Remember the little sigh, just as his lips had touched hers. See the warm smile on her face as she told him, “Go get him!” before letting him go again.

And he could still remember the amused disgust on Colonel Phillips' face as he’d growled, “I ain’t kissing ya!” before he stepped harder on the accelerator, making up just enough ground so that Steve could finally leap from the car onto the wheel of Schmidt’s plane. He’d wanted to look back, catch one more glimpse of Peggy before he left, but he had a mission to accomplish. It had been easier to focus on the mission than on his utter astonishment that Peggy Carter had just kissed him.

He’d been carrying a torch for Peggy ever since he’d first laid eyes on her. That day she’d walked, no strutted, out in front of the line of soldiers at Camp Lehigh, head held high, eyes sharp, evaluating each one of them with a critical eye. Hodge had mouthed off at her, and she’d put him in his place, in the dirt, with one well placed punch. And Steve had loved her ever since. He’d tried not to show it, but he knew he’d hidden it badly. At first he could barely look at her. And it seemed like every time he’d tried to talk to her he’d become impossibly tongue tied and said the wrong thing. It had gotten better after the serum, because he no longer worried that she was just taking pity on him when she smiled at him. He’d finally learned how to talk to her without stammering and blushing. And Peggy was the one who had convinced him that he could make more of a contribution to the war as a soldier than as a dancing monkey selling war bonds.

Dancing.

Steve sucked in his breath. He had a date to go dancing. With Peggy. At the Stork Club. If the good Lord had ever given a man a reason to live, a date with Peggy Carter was it. Not only had Peggy Carter kissed him, but she’d made a date with him.

He had to get back to England, back to London, back to Peggy.

He looked around frantically, where was his compass? He’d remembered that he’d put it on the altimeter, so that her face would be the last thing he’d see as he dove the plane into the cold arctic waters. He stood up, and understood why he’d felt off balance. The floor of the plane was definitely slanted, nose down. The angle wasn’t so steep that he couldn’t walk, but the floor definitely wasn’t level. He carefully put down Stark’s chemical light in a small pile of snow on the floor, scooping up more snow around it so it wouldn’t tip over, and started searching. He had no idea how long he searched, but he was tired and cold when he finally found it. The force of the crash had thrown it all the way to the back of the cockpit, where it had lodged behind one of the struts.

Steve flipped it open and looked at Peggy’s photo. The photographer had caught her doing something else, and in the photo she was half-turned to look over her shoulder, looking severely at the camera. Steve had found the photo in one of the after action reports he’d been reading during his first weeks after he’d been put in charge of the Howling Commandos. Some wise guy photographer had probably called out to her and snapped the photo while he was taking pictures of the base they’d captured. Steven hadn’t stolen anything since he stole a candy bar when he was eight and Father O’Conner had given a sermon the very next Sunday about how theft was a mortal sin, but he took one look at that photo and quietly tucked it into his jacket pocket. It wasn’t relevant to the report, and he knew nobody would miss it. Once he’d gotten back to his quarters he’d carefully cut out her face, hiding it inside his compass where no one could see it, but he could keep her with him when he went on missions. That stern glare had given him courage more times that he liked to admit.

Whenever he looked at it, he could almost hear her crisp English accent asking, “Well Rogers, what are you waiting for? Get moving!”

Steve tucked the compass safely back into the pouch on his belt and patted it to make sure it was secure. Now that he’d found it, he could take a look around and see what his situation was. The huge glass windows of the bomber had somehow mostly survived the crash. He hated to admit it, but those Germans really knew how to build a plane. There were a few small holes, a couple of broken panes of glass, Steve thought he remembered some of them from on the way down, but outside the glass was a solid wall of white. He poked at one of the holes. Snow. He must have crashed somewhere cold and it had snowed on the plane while he was unconscious. He couldn’t see any daylight at all through the snow, so it must have been snowing pretty heavily.

Stark’s chemical flare was starting to weaken. Steve fished around in his belt and found a second one. He cracked it, and then set it down on the control panel. He checked his pouch, he had a dozen more of the clever little flares. He’d had to be careful with them. Once they were all used up, he’d be in the dark again unless he could find some other source of light in the wreckage of the bomber.

Using the light from the flare, he set about seeing what else had survived the crash besides himself. He settled back into the pilot’s seat and started testing switches. It didn’t matter which switch he flipped, nothing happened. Not a single light flickered on the controls. No sound came from the speakers, not even static, no matter which channel he tried. He tried each of the switches twice, three times, but still didn’t get any response from any of them.

Then he remembered the other planes. The bomber had been carrying a squadron of fighters, small, maneuverable one-man jet planes. He picked up the flare and worked his way up the slanted floor, through the wreckage to the back of the plane. There should still be a half a dozen fighters left back in the hanger bay.

The left wing of the bomber looked like it had been sheared off in the crash, there was a gaping hole in the side of the bomber, completely blocked by a solid wall of snow that reached the top of the hole and had spilled partially into that side of the hanger bay. But the right side of the gigantic bomber was still intact, and it miraculously still held four of the small fighters tucked in under the wing.

Steve climbed into the cockpit of the first fighter and looked for something resembling a radio. By this point he knew enough German to read each of the neat labels under each knob and switch, and even though there was what was clearly a speaker on the control panel, none of the switches said anything to do with communications. Steve swore under his breath. He climbed into the cockpit of each fighter and checked. None of them had any sort of radio installed in them. Schmidt must have designed them as suicide bombers, where none of the pilots was expected to return to the huge winged bomber. The man was even more evil than he’d thought. Which just made Steve even happier that he’d been able to watch him die.

Well, if he couldn’t call for help, what was he going to do? Steve sat in the cockpit of the last plane, the one marked for Washington DC, and thought. There had to be some way out of this situation. Then he realized, if he could get the fighter off the bomber and into the air, he could fly himself home. That is, if any of the fighters was still in any shape to fly. And if he could get it out of the bomber. He tried turning over the engine of the one he was sitting in. Nothing happened. “Typical,” he muttered, “Nothing good ever seems to come out of DC anyways.”

He got out and carefully inspected each of the remaining jets. The one marked Philadelphia had a bullet hole in the tank and there was a frozen puddle of fuel on the floor below it. The one marked Detroit started up, then belched a huge cloud of smoke into the hanger bay before Steve could shut down the engine. He coughed for a few minutes until the smoke cleared a little. When he crawled out of the cockpit, the air still smelled of burnt engine oil. He popped open the hood and checked to make sure nothing was on fire. It wouldn’t do to be trapped inside a frozen bomber and have a fire break out.

He carefully inspected the last fighter, this one marked Boston, before he climbed inside. He couldn’t find any holes in the fuselage, or any obvious problems with the engine. He kicked over the engine and it fired right up. “Well, looks like I’m a Boston boy.” He muttered to himself. He only let the engine run for a few seconds before shutting it down again. Detroit had already fouled his limited air supply. Any further engine tests would have to wait until he’d dug out and had a supply of fresh air.

Steve returned to the cockpit and started a methodical search for useful things. Like food and water, weapons, and any sort of tools that he could use to dig his way out or repair the communications equipment. The bomber clearly had been used to transport troops between HYDRA bases, because he found several cases of food and water strapped down in the enormous cockpit, and there were two troop bunks, one on each side of the plane, designed to sleep eight men each. He had plenty of blankets to keep warm at night. And sheets, if he needed to make ropes or bandages.

When he searched the hanger bay, he also found two of the HYDRA energy pistols and one of their big rifles that must have been dropped in the fight. He tested each of them, firing out the broken side of the bomber at the wall of snow. All of them seemed to be in working order. Steve didn’t anticipate needing to defend himself, and he couldn’t use a weapon that vaporized what it hit to go hunting, but it sure made nice little holes in the snow. He focused one of the pistols in the direction that he hoped was “up” and kept firing.

Eventually he caught a whiff of fresh air. He carefully worked to expand the hole until it was about six inches across. Then he lowered the pistol and pressed his nose against the hole and breathed in the fresh, crisp, cold air. The hanger bay still smelled faintly of Detroit’s smoky exhaust. He managed to make a half a dozen more small holes before whatever powered the pistol ran out of energy. Well, it wasn’t much, but the air felt fresher than it had when he started. And at least it would ensure that he didn’t die of smoke inhalation in his sleep.

By this point, Steve was feeling close to exhaustion. He had no idea how long he’d been awake, or how long he’d been working. But he realized, he hadn’t eaten or drunk anything since before the 107th started their assault on Schmidt’s fortress, and that was hours (or days) ago. It was well past time for him to have something to eat and drink. He rifled through the cases he’d found in the cockpit and carrying an armload of field rations and a gallon of water, he made for one of the crew quarters.

While he was stripping the blankets off of all of the beds to make himself a nest, he found an unopened bottle of Schnapps under one of the pillows. “Well, I might not be able to get drunk, but this might help me sleep. And if nothing else, it might help warm me up.” Steve thought as he settled into a pile of blankets with his feast.

Field rations were never fine dining, but Steve had learned that when you’re really hungry? Anything tastes good. And he’d worked up an appetite. He needed to remember what the doctors from Project Rebirth had told him, the Super Soldier serum had increased his metabolism, he needed slightly more food than the average soldier. And when his body was healing from an injury, he needed extra nutrition. Steve ate until he felt uncomfortably full, then ate one more field ration just to be sure. Then he opened the bottle of Schnapps and toasted to nobody in particular, “Here’s to your health!” He drank the entire bottle, then rolled himself up in the blankets, and pulled two more over top of him.

He fell asleep almost instantly, the way experienced soldiers learn to sleep during any lull in the action.

**Day Two**

When he woke up to pitch dark again he was momentarily confused. But when he threw off the mountain of blankets and the cold hit him, he remembered where he was. Trapped in Schmidt’s crashed bomber, buried somewhere in the snow.

He fumbled for the battery operated flashlight that he’d found during his search of the bomber. It had gotten tangled up in the bedding, and it took a while for him to figure out where the hard lump of the torch was in all the layers of thick wool blankets. Once he’d flipped it on, he found the fleece-lined bomber jacket and wool watch cap that he’d stashed under the covers to hopefully keep them a bit warmer than the storage locker where he’d found them.

Steve plowed through enough field rations for breakfast to empty one of the storage containers. Then he used the empty container as a latrine. He re-sealed the lid carefully before moving it to the damaged barracks on the left side of the bomber and shooting another air hole in the snow to let in some more fresh air, because _whew_ , unless he could get outside the plane and bury it, _that_ was going to start to smell in a couple of days.

Now that he was well fed and well rested, and his body had had some more time to recover, he felt like he could think more clearly. Steve cleared away the wreckage near the control panel for the bomber’s aft doors and tried to open the hanger bay doors. Nothing moved. He left the switch in the “open” position and tried to open the doors manually.

After several minutes of solid pushing with no result, Steve decided he needed to attack this problem from a different angle. If the doors wouldn’t open pushing out, then he’d open them inward. He found a screwdriver in a maintenance locker and got to work removing the hinges on the bomber’s rear door. Once he had removed the hinges, he started working on prying the door off from the inside.

It only took a little bit of leverage for the door to come free. But as the weight started to shift, Steve suddenly found himself pushed back by an unexpected weight. By the time he untangled himself from the doors, several large chunks of snow and ice had fallen into the hanger bay. Despite the huge pile of snow that had fallen into the plane, the back exit of the bomber was still completely blocked by a wall of snow and ice. Steve carefully stacked the doors against the wall, and got started shifting the snow away from the fighter labeled Boston, until he had a clear path to the now open doorway.

Steve sighed, it didn’t look like it was just snow that had fallen while he was unconscious after the crash. He took the time to carefully re-examine the air holes that he’d shot it the wall of snow before he’d gone to bed. Despite the fact that each hole was at least six inches in diameter, he could only just see a tiny window of light at the top of each one. He realized that when he’d crashed, the heat of the jet’s engines must have melted the snow and the plane had continued to sink as long as the engines had been radiating heat.

The plane was buried. He was buried. And it was hard to tell just how far down the plane had sunk into the snow before the engines had completely cooled. He examined the wall of snow by the broken wing. It was a pretty solid mass of snow and ice. He tried the door on the other side of the plane, wrenching it free, and shooting another air hole on that side of the plane, which used up the energy cell on the second pistol. It was the same solid mass of snow and ice. He had no idea how far down he was, but if he had to guess, he’d say that even the back door of the plane was several feet down.

Then he checked the back hatch of the plane again. The snow here was fluffier, there was less ice. _This_ snow must have landed on the plane after it had augured into the ice pack and hadn’t had time to compact yet. That was good, if he was going to get one of the fighters out of the plane, it was going to be out the back hatch. So if there was somewhere he wanted the snow to be easier to dig through, this was the right place.

Steve looked around until he found the HYDRA energy rifle that he’d found the night before. Bracing himself, he fired it out of the back door of the bomber until he saw daylight. Once he’d blasted a hole to the surface, he worked on enlarging the hole as much as he could, until, like the two pistols, he’s exhausted whatever energy source powered the rifle.

Steve sighed and resigned himself to the fact that he was going to have to dig the rest of the way free by hand. And it was going to take a lot of work before he had a hole large enough to get the fighter free. But he had a plan for how to rescue himself, he had food and water, and he’d already made a good start on digging his way to the surface. Before he’d exhausted the battery, he’d blasted a hole to the surface that was probably big enough for him to climb free of the buried bomber. In fact, he promised himself that would be the first thing he’d do in the morning.

He took a break to eat again. And conduct a second search of all the containers and storage lockers to see if he could find another pistol or rifle. But the only weapons on the bomber were the machine guns on the fighters and the three energy weapons dropped by the pilots during their fight with Steve.

So for now he devoted himself to the task of starting to clear a path from the back of the bomber to the surface for the little fighter jet named Boston. He tried using a shovel that he found in one of the tools lockers, but that seemed to take too long. He ended up using his shield to gouge big chunks of snow free from the doorway.

It didn’t take him long to realize that the snow he was pulling loose had to go somewhere, and until he broke free and could dump it on the surface, that somewhere was inside the plane. He piled the snow on a blanket and used that to drag it to the other side of the hanger bay. Once the snow started piling up too high, he had to start smashing it down every time he dragged over another load of snow. This had been so much easier when the energy beam of the HYDRA rifle had just vaporized the snow. He gritted his teeth and worked until his muscles told him it was time to stop.

He ate another huge meal of field rations, visited his improvised latrine, and snuggled up under the pile of wool blankets again. He allowed himself five minutes of flashlight time looking at the picture of Peggy inside his compass before he shook himself and turned off the light.

He’d see her again. He was sure of it now. He could see the light at the end of the tunnel, and that light was daylight. Which meant freedom.

**Day Three**

Steve was cold and stiff when he woke up the next morning. He did jumping-jacks and calisthenics until he felt like he could feel his fingers and toes again. At first his feet hurt, but that didn’t last long, so he was relieved that the serum seemed to also include protection against frostbite.

He ate a hearty breakfast of field rations and then stripped the sheets from the beds in the damaged barracks and set to work making himself a rope for his climb to the surface. Once he had several strips braided and tied together, he collected his gear and started climbing. He hammered two extra long wrenches from the tools locker into the ice to use as pitons, carefully placing one before moving the other. Slowly, he inched his way toward the surface, moving the makeshift rope and his anchors as he worked his way towards the surface.

Finally he was free. He put on the sunglasses that he scavenged from a locker before poking his head out. After so much time in the near darkness of the buried bomber, the light was blinding. At first all he could see was white, but eventually his eyes adjusted and he could start to make out more detail. It was still all white, but could start to make out some different shapes in the mass of white. He turned and saw the long trail of gouges in the ice that must have been made as the bomber skidded across the show and ice as it crashed.

Steve slammed his shield into the snow to mark the entrance to the tunnel down to the bomber and started to explore. He started small, circling around where he’d exited the bomber. He found more evidence of the crash, chunks of metal, pieces of the missing part of the wing, two of the wheels from the landing gear.

He slowly widened the circle as he explored, walking a few more feet in every direction, but always keeping one eye on his shield, which marked his only source of food and water in this snowy wilderness. Other than the wreckage, there was nothing but snow, as far as the eye could see. Once he got a little further out he found the snow made a steep drop-off. He’d managed to crash the bomber into the side of a mountain of snow and ice that after a long steep-looking slope looked like it sheared off into a cliff. Steve scrambled as far down the slope as his bed sheet rope would let him, and peered over the edge. More snow. And then maybe a lake, or possibly the ocean?

He couldn’t tell if he was on land, or an immense ice floe. But it didn’t really matter either way. There were no signs of life, no matter where he looked. No smoke, no lights, no boats, not even any animals.

He was alone.

Steve shook himself before he started thinking about that too much. At least the snow was fairly level. He didn’t need to clear a runway for the fighter. All he needed to do was clear enough snow to get the small fighter to the surface. And now that he was outside the bomber, that should be even easier, because he could just pile the snow up instead of having to pack it down. Steve paced off a few steps on either side of his tunnel, marked the sides of the hole he wanted to dig, and started digging.

It went much faster now that he had sunshine and fresh air and he didn’t need to stamp down every blanket full of snow that he moved. Using the shield, he flung great chunks of snow over his shoulders. Once he got a couple of feet down, he couldn’t fling the snow as far anymore. He had to take a break and change tactics. He slithering back down the tunnel into the bomber, and ate something. When he climbed back to the surface, he brought the blanket and started making a ramp. He could fill the blanket up pretty quickly, but hiking back to the surface to dump the bundle of snow slowed him down a bit. But he worked steadily, cheerful now because he could see that he was making clear progress. By the end of the day, he could see that he’d cleared more than halfway down to the hanger bay door.

**Day Four**

It took Steve another day to completely dig out the bomber’s hanger bay doors. Once he’d cleared the snow, he had to consider how he was going to get the fighter to the surface. He roamed around the various levels of the bomber, now with slightly more daylight than before, and searched for anything that might be useful.

He finally rigged up several lengths of chain, wrapped and carefully padded with sheets, around Boston, and an equally carefully padded harness to go around his shoulders. He climbed the surface and donned the harness, backing away from the hole until the chains went taught and he could feel the fighter start to inch up the ramp. Steve struggled and heaved and despite one scary moment where he lost his footing and slid back almost six feet, he finally saw the nose of the small fighter inching above the entrance to the ramp. He kept pulling until the fighter was completely free, and then moved her a few feet more, just to make sure.

And that’s when he realized the fatal flaw in his plan.

The little HYDRA fighter didn’t have landing gear. She wasn’t designed to roll down a runway, gaining speed until she could lift off, she was designed to launch from the bomber, to be dropped into flight when she was already in the air.

The realization that he couldn’t take off hit Steve so hard he sat down in the snow and dropped his head into his hands. How could he have come so far and not realized this? Now what was he going to do? It didn’t matter if he could smooth out a runway, without wheels there was no way he could launch the small fighter into the air. This wasn’t like when he had to hot wire a Nazi Jeep because he didn’t have the key. He couldn’t just roll the damn thing downhill and pop the clutch to get the engine to start….

Or could he?

Steve sat up straight, then stood up and wrapped his sheet-rope around his waist again. He walked over to the edge of the cliff and edged his way down as far as the rope would allow. The slope was steep, he should be able to build up a lot of speed in a short amount of time before going over the edge of the cliff.

He went back and examined the fighter. The bottom was smooth enough. But how could he keep the rounded craft upright, how could he steer? Could he craft some sort of sled or skis? Or should he just dig a channel and slide down it, like a bobsled run? Could he actually push her down the slope and somehow manage to jump in, like the Olympic bobsledders he’d seen in the newsreels when he was a boy?

Steve climbed back up the slope and looked back down the slope. It was short, but steep. Once he hit the drop off, there’d be no turning back. Either he’d be able to launch the fighter, or there was a pretty good chance he’d kill himself in a crash. Or worse, survive the crash and not be able to climb back to the bomber, where there was food and water for at least another few weeks.

He had to try. If he stayed here, he’d freeze to death. Better to take the chance than wait for a slow death due to cold and hunger.

He spent the rest of the day using his shield to carve a channel down the hill. His sheet rope only reached so far. But before he went to bed, he’d dug a channel as far as he could reach.

**Day Five**

In the morning he stripped all the rest of the sheets off the bunks and made more rope. He spent the rest of the morning lengthening his channel down the hill towards the drop-off until he ran out of rope. Then he climbed back up the slope and started prepping for takeoff.

Steve checked Boston’s fuel tanks. They were full. The tanks seemed to be good sized. He didn’t know anything about how much fuel the fighter would need to get him home, but he had to hope that would be enough to get him back to England. Maybe HYDRA had figured out a way to make a plane fly further with less fuel.

He practiced jumping into the cockpit a couple of times while it was standing still. The first time he tangled his legs as he went over the side, and almost fell into the control panel. He tried it a few more times, until his body was comfortable with the motion and his muscles knew exactly how far to tuck and when to extend so that his feet landed in the proper place in the cramped cockpit. Then he tried it ten more times, just to make sure he knew the motion, because he’d be running alongside the fighter when he tried it again.

Once he was sure he could launch himself into the fighter, Steve lowered himself back into the belly of the bomber and took one last look around. He checked over the parachute he’d chosen again. Just to reassure himself that it was properly packed, and that none of the lines were damaged. Just in case he got hungry (who was he kidding, he was _always_ hungry) he packed a couple of the field rations and a canteen for the trip. And before he left the bomber, he had one more, enormous meal. And made one last visit to his makeshift latrine. Then he made his final climb up out of the buried bomber and into the light.

It didn’t take him long to drag the fighter over to the top of his chute down the hill. Steve was careful not to get too close to the edge. It wouldn’t do to have the fighter start sliding down the slope before he was ready. He slammed his shield into the ground as a brace while he popped open the canopy and stowed his supplies inside the tiny cockpit.

Steve removed the shield, stowing it safely at the back of the seat and checked that everything was secure inside the cockpit. Then he checked his supplies a third time. He had his compass with the picture of Peggy, he had his shield. There was nothing else he needed from the wreckage of the bomber.

He took a deep breath, crossed himself, and gripped the edge of Boston’s cockpit. He used the toe of his boot to dig a little hole in the snow, the same way the Olympic sprinters dug a little hole at the starting line. Then, using the toeholds, he started pushing the little fighter towards the slope. She picked up speed as she settled into the channel that he’d dug, and Steve started jogging alongside her, still pushing. Once she started going faster than he could run, he vaulted over the edge of the cockpit and into the pilot’s seat. He pulled the canopy shut and hit the start button, holding tight to the stick with his other hand.

The engine coughed. Steve cursed and toggled the start button again. The engine coughed a second time, but didn’t start. Steve glanced out the window, he was nearing the end of the slope, the edge of the cliff was rapidly growing closer.

He flipped the switches a third time and prayed.

The engine coughed, and the little fighter shot out over the edge of the cliff and into space.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The winter Olympics in 1940 were scheduled and cancelled three times. They were supposed to be held in Japan, and then Switzerland, and then Germany. 
> 
> Bobsledding _was_ a sport in the last Winter Olympics to actually be held before the war. The 1936 Winter Games in Germany held competition in both two man and four man bobsledding. Since we know young Steve loved the movies, and the United States won gold and bronze in the two man bobsled, I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that Steve would have been familiar with how bobsledders run beside the sled before jumping in.


	4. Back in England

Ozwald Burke was 82 years old, but that didn’t mean that he couldn’t make a contribution to the war effort. He’d been too old to enlist when the Great War happened, but he’d lost a son and two grandsons to the war effort. So when he’d seen the notice in the paper that they were forming a civilian Observer Corps to watch the coastline, he’d been first in line to sign up for duty. He might be old, but his eyes were still sharp and his mind was too. No damned Krauts were going to sneak ashore during his watch. Their small cottage on the coast near Clevedon gave him a line of sight to watch over the Bristol Channel for any signs of Nazi submarines, boats or planes headed towards Cardiff or Newport or Bristol.

Burke spent every waking hour sitting on a bench outside his seaside cottage, his ROC helmet clapped to his head, an antiquated hunting rifle by his side, and a pair of binoculars scanning the water for the enemy. When the weather was bad, he sat in the parlor and stared out the sitting room windows, or climbed up into the attic and peered out the windows at either end of the long room, which gave him a different view of the channel depending on which window he chose.

Most days there wasn’t much to see other than a steady stream of shipping vessels and the occasional American troop transport. He’d learned to recognize the shapes of all the regular traffic, and kept a small notebook tucked in his breast pocket that listed all the details of each ship and plane. He slept with it under his pillow. Couldn’t allow that information to fall into the wrong hands now, could we? One night there had been some strange lights out in the channel. He’d called that one in to the local authorities, but never heard anything back. But he was still up at dawn, day after day, scanning the water for signs of Nazi submarines or ships. Sometimes, after dark, if he couldn’t sleep and the weather was fine, he’d sneak back outside in his nightshirt and slippers and keep up his watch over the darkened skies and waters. More than once he’d woken up to find that during the night his wife Bessie had draped a blanket around him and tucked a pillow between his head and the wall of the cottage.

But today was different. Today, something was _definitely_ going on out over the channel. He dropped the binoculars and peeked at the lenses. They were clean, none of the local lads had painted anything on them while he’d been having his tea and biscuits. No, his eyes weren’t deceiving him, that small speck off over the channel was a plane. The RAF didn’t usually approach from this direction, where were they headed? He watched, rapt, as it grew closer. No, not one plane, _three_ planes.

And then he saw the first flash. Was that gunfire? As the three small specks slowly grew closer, he could make out more details. The lead plane was bobbing and weaving, and the small flashes were definitely coming from the two planes that were trailing it. Then the lead plane banked sharply, and he could clearly see the markings on the side. Not Royal Air Force. He’d never seen one like it before, but he was positive it was definitely German.

“Bessie, call down to the RAF office! We’ve got something going on out here!”

“Yes dear.” His wife’s voice sounded resigned. She’d long since been informed by the local RAF office to stop calling them whenever Burke ordered her to, as they were tired of getting called out to the cottage for Burke’s false alarms.

“No, this time I mean it Bessie! There’s a bloody Nazi plane right off shore. And two RAF fighters right on its tail!” Burke’s voice sounded so gleeful that Bessie stuck her grey head out the door just to check on him, maybe he’d had a touch too much sun for one day? Burke waved in the direction of the channel, and the smoke trails and tracer bullets were now clear as day, even without binoculars. Bessie ducked back into the house and ran for the telephone in the front hallway.

“Told you, you old bat,” Burke muttered under his breath, cackling gleefully to himself, eyes still glued to the dogfight playing out right in front of his eyes. “I might even get a medal for this.” He smiled to himself. He’s like to shake Churchill’s hand he would. And then give him a piece of his mind about how he was running this war. If Burke had been in charge, the war would have been over months ago, it would have.

Just then the smaller plane started smoking badly and went into a dive. Burke tracked its path and he could just see when the canopy popped open and a body went hurtling out towards the water of the channel. Burke kept his binoculars trained on the body, but he never saw a parachute blossom. The body just hurtled straight towards the dark waters of the channel, until it disappeared out of sight behind the sand dunes.

He grabbed the rifle, leaning against the bench close to his hip. “Bessie, I’m headed down to the shore. Have you got the RAF office yet?”

“No Ozzy, but Charlotte is ringing me through right now.” His wife’s voice came faint from the front of the house.

“Good, I might need the help.” And Burke stumped down through the dunes towards the shore, eyes still scanning for the man he knew he’d seen jump out of the plane. Even if he all he found was the body washed up on shore, it might still contribute to the war effort.

***

When Steve had entered the coordinates for Bristol, the navigation screen in the fighter had shown a surprisingly detailed map of England, as well as detailed information about how long the flight would take. Steve had set the fighter for autopilot, and gotten comfortable in the small cockpit. It was designed for a large man, but not quite as large as Steve, and his legs were a bit cramped. He tried to find a comfortable position where his feet wouldn’t kick the pedals, but finally decided that there was no way to stretch out without accidentally touching the controls. He sighed and curled into a smaller ball. It was going to be a long flight.

He hadn’t planned on it, but he must have dozed off. Because the next thing he knew, a warning buzzer in the cockpit was going off, and there was tracer fire coming from behind him. He shook his head and grabbed the stick. Flicking off the autopilot, he rolled the plane, and then glanced at the navigation. He was over the Bristol Channel, just approaching the southern tip of England. He must have run into an RAF shore patrol.

He went into a steep dive and pulled up just before he hit the water. Whoever was on his tail couldn’t follow him. He checked the sensors, and they showed him the two planes, still at the same altitude. They must have thought they’d shot him down.

He skimmed the surface of the ocean for a few minutes, keeping just a few hundred feet above the waves, but when he got closer to shore he realized that wasn’t going to be safe either, not with the well organized Royal Observer Corps, and he once again pointed the fighter to climb up into the thin clouds for what little cover they could provide him.

The two fighters were well off to his left, probably headed for Swansea or Cardiff. Steve hoped they wouldn’t notice him, but it looked like his luck had run out. He’d always known he wasn’t going to be able to land the nimble little plane, hell, the damned thing didn’t even come equipped with landing gear, but he had hoped that he’d at least be able to get a little bit closer to shore before he had to ditch it in the ocean. He’d hoped to be able to crash close enough to shore to allow them to salvage the sleek HYDRA fighter. He knew that Howard Stark would be beside himself with glee if he could get his hands on some more HYDRA tech to play with.

Just then the cockpit alarm went off again and there was a fresh burst of machine gun fire as two new RAF planes dropped out of the clouds behind him. Silently Steve cursed Schmidt for the lack of radios in the fighters. There was no way that he could contact the pilots pursuing him and let them know that he was a friendly. Just a friendly who happened to be flying an enemy plane towards some of their biggest shipyards. Steve sighed again. This was going to be difficult.

He tried waggling his wings, but the two pilots continued to take shots at him anytime he drifted into their crosshairs. He did a couple of barrel rolls, but started to feel dizzy and had to stop. Even reversing direction and flying right at the two planes, so that they might catch a glimpse of him in the cockpit didn’t work. He continued to hear the rat-a-tat-tat of machine gun fire as he barreled closer to the shore. Suddenly there was a sickening _thunk_ and several warning lights started flashing on the cockpit dashboard. He glanced over his shoulder and there was smoke billowing behind him. He started to lose altitude. Steve gritted his teeth and put the small fighter into a steep dive towards the ocean below.

He didn’t have time to pull the ripcord on his parachute, but his Captain America shield helped absorb the impact when his body hit the water. But as soon as he’d surfaced, the damned thing was in the way. He had to sink below the surface again to swing it behind his head and hoped that the magnets on his harness would catch before he ran out of air. He could swim, but one of the few downsides of his physical transformation was that he now carried so much muscle mass that he’d gone from being a strong swimmer to being a sinker. Once he felt the shield was secure he kicked his way back to the surface and started swimming hard for the shore. He knew he only had a slim chance of making it before his arms gave out.

This time Lady Luck was with him and Steve staggered to shore and collapsed above the water line, breathing hard. Most of their missions had been on dry land, and he hadn’t had to swim that far since the first week or two after his transformation, when he’d spent hours in the base pool, swimming endless laps, to test his new strength and stamina for the scientists and doctors of Operation Rebirth.

Just as his breath was starting to slow, he felt the cold, hard barrel of a gun against the back of his right ear.

“Gotcha!”

“Sir…” A boot landed on the back of his skull, pushing his face into the sand.

The gun dug painfully against his skull. “Don’t say another damned word. Just get up and get marching you dirty Kraut.”

The pressure against his head eased off. Steve sighed and nodded, too tired to argue with his captor. He slowly raised his head and spit out a mouthful of sand. “I surrender.”

“Good. Speak English do you now? Get up, slowly now, and don’t try anything tricky. My mate’s up on the dunes, has you right in his sights.”

Steve nodded again and got slowly to his feet, brushing the sand off his face once he was standing.

“Big one aren’t ya? Hands on your head where I can see them.” Steve raised his hands and laced them over his head. “Now march.” He pointed and Steve followed the faint path through the sand dunes.

They’d just reached the road when a military vehicle screeched to a halt.

“Burke?” The lone man in the Jeep was shouting at them.

“Right over here!” Steve risked turning and saw his captor for the first time. It was a remarkable sight. The old fellow must have been eighty if he was a day, but he was decked out in a slightly shabby and obviously homemade but clean and well pressed uniform, an ROC helmet on his head, barely containing a mop of wild grey hair.

“Burke, what is it now? I wouldn’t have bothered to come out, except that the exchange said your wife was practically hysterical. You know we warned you about….” The RAF officer’s voice died as he jumped down out of the Jeep and came around to inspect Burke’s prisoner.

He took one look at Steve’s uniform and gasped. “Captain Rogers?” Steve nodded. The officer snapped a salute, “We’ve been searching for you sir. Command told us to be on the lookout for any sign of you. Corporal Johnson sir.”

Steve returned the salute. “Johnson, what day is it?”

“Saturday sir.”

“Good, we’ve still got time. I need to get to London tonight. It’s urgent.”

“I can take you as far as Reading sir, but I’m not authorized to go any further.”

“That would be a huge help Corporal.”

“Hey, hey, whot’s all this then?” Burke growled, still holding his rifle on his prisoner. “What are you doing with my prisoner?”

Johnson winked broadly at Steve before drawing his pistol. “Um, we’ll take it from here Burke. Thank you very much.” And Johnson gave the old man a snappy salute. “Corporal Johnson taking command of the prisoner from ROC Shore Patrol Ozwald Burke. Thank you sir, I’ll see that he’s taken care of.” He nudged Steve with the pistol, and tilted his head towards the Jeep. “Get in now, and don’t try anything funny.”

Steve put his hands back over his head. “No sir.” Steve tried to suppress his grin as he climbed into the Jeep. Johnson followed him, climbing into the driver’s seat and pulling a neat three-point turn.

“I’ll make sure I inform Command of your contribution to the war effort.” Johnson shouted over his shoulder as they took off back down the road the way he’d come. Steve was impressed at his ability to maintain a straight face while he said it.

“You do that!” Burke yelled, waving his rifle after them before lowering it and stomping back towards his cottage.

As they bounced off down the road, Steve turned to Johnson, “I take it you know Mr. Burke well?”

“All too well.” Johnson grinned at him. “The old coot’s had us hopping with false alarms until the commander finally told us to just ignore him. At least this time he actually had something useful to report.”

“Can you really get me all the way to Reading?” Steve checked the angle of the sun in the sky. It was 120 miles from Bristol to London. If he could catch a ride for most of the journey, he just might manage to make his date with Peggy.

“Yes sir, but I’ll need some petrol if I’m going to get back to base before they notice I’m missing.”

“Get me to the Reading motor pool and I can authorize all the petrol you need Corporal.”

“Deal sir. And can I ask, where have you been?”

“I’m not at liberty to say right now.” Steve figured the less he said, the less trouble he could get into with Colonel Phillips.

“Understood sir.” Johnson drove in silence for a few minutes. “Am I allowed to say that I found you sir?”

Steve thought for a moment. Army and RAF scuttlebutt traveled faster than official news sometimes. He wasn’t sure he wanted news of his return to reach London before he did. He didn’t want to get trapped in a debrief before he could find Peggy. “Hoping to get a few free beers out of this story?”

“You know it sir.” The corporal grinned at him.

“I’m afraid my mission is secret. Once it’s complete, you can brag all you want. But for now, I’m going to have to ask you to keep it under your hat that you’ve seen me.”

“Understood sir. And sir?”

“Yes?”

“Glad to have you back sir.”

“Glad to be back.”

***

Steve made it all the way to their base outside of London before he ran into anyone that knew him personally. When his ride from Reading to London dropped him off at the motor pool, the private behind the counter goggled at him as he slipped out of the shack and jogged back to his quarters.

He was running really late, it was past the time he was supposed to meet Peggy. But he hadn’t had a shower in a week, and there was no way he was showing up for his date in a dirty uniform smelling like he’d just taken a swim in the channel and jogged half the way to London.

Twenty minutes later, he slipped back into the motor pool, showered, freshly shaved, and in a clean uniform. A large figure stepped out of the shadows.

“Where the hell have you been soldier? We’ve been looking for you for days.” Colonel Phillips was chewing on a cigar, but didn’t look displeased to see him.

Steve only stopped long enough to salute, then he kept walking. “I’m sorry sir, I’ll explain tomorrow. Right now I’m late for a date.”

“A date? What the hell are you talking about son?” Phillips growled.

Steve climbed into a Jeep and turned over the engine. “I’m sorry sir, I’ll explain later!” He put the Jeep in gear and peeled out of the motor pool in a spray of dirt and gravel.

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Phillips pushed back his cap and scratched his head. “Guess I might as well tell Command the good news that we’ve got Captain America back.” And he waved a hand at the shocked Private in charge of the motor pool. “At ease son, at ease. You did the right thing calling me. Now get back to work.”

The Private nodded and ducked back inside his office.

**Saturday - The Stork Club**  
Peggy picked up the glass and tossed back the last of the melted ice. It only tasted faintly of the whiskey she’d been nursing all night while she waited. Putting the glass back on the table she made up her mind. Steve wasn’t coming back. She’d been trying to deny it for the past week, but she had to face the facts. He wasn’t ever coming back. She picked up her bag and stood up, turning quickly and walking right into someone behind her.

The man caught her in his arms as they collided. He smelled of whiskey and soap and his arms were strong as they steadied her. “Ohh, I’m sorry Ma’am.” He stepped back, then looked down at her and a shy grin broke out across his familiar face.

She stared at him. “Steve!” It _was_ Steve. Standing there in front of her, every stitch of his Army uniform perfect down to the crease in his trousers, his hair still damp from the shower.

A shy grin broke out across his familiar face as he shifted from one foot to the other. That face, _that_ was why she had waited two hours past their appointed meeting time: she had been hoping against hope that she’d get to see his face again. That bashful adoration when he looked at her, and then couldn’t keep looking at her but had to look away. Steve was always somehow hopeful and afraid of her at the same time.

It always gave Peggy a little secret thrill that she had so much power over the heroic Captain America. That he followed her orders without question (unlike so many of the other men that she’d had to deal with in the SSR). That he listened to her, and seemed to actually respect her as a person, and not just “another dame.”

“Peggy.” He nodded to her, still getting used to the sound of her first name coming out of his mouth. They’d been formal with each other for so long. She’d outranked him right up until Colonel Phillips had given him a field promotion to match the rank of Captain that he’d been using for months despite the fact that his military records didn’t have him listed as an officer. It still felt odd to him to be on equal terms with her after following her orders for so many months, first during boot camp, and then when she was his Operations Supervisor.

“Where the hell have you been? You’re late!” She wanted to fling her arms around him and kiss him. But instead she put her hands on her hips and glowered at him as if he were still the green Private she’d met almost three years before.

He looked adorably bashful as he answered her. “I’m know, I’m late. And I’m sorry. But I’m here now, and that’s all that matters isn’t it?” He bent over and retrieved her bag from the floor. Holding it in front of his privates like a shield, he said, “You said you’d teach me how to dance, didn’t you?”

Peggy took a deep breath. She had just finally resigned herself to the idea that he wasn’t coming back, and here he was. She almost couldn’t believe it was him standing in front of her. She swallowed hard, “That I did.” She held out her hand for the bag. Steve surrendered it with visible relief.

Peggy placed it firmly on the table behind her and held out her hand to him. Steve took it and she slowly led him out to a quiet corner on the dance floor.

When they stood facing each other, Steve swallowed and said, “I don’t know what to do.”

“Haven’t you ever danced before?” He’d told her he hadn’t, but she found that hard to believe. Especially after meeting his friend Sergeant Barnes, who seemed to have been quite the lady’s man. Surely there had been double dates back in Brooklyn?

“No ma’am, not really.”

“Well, you take this hand…” she grabbed his right hand, “and put it on my waist.” She moved it into position. “or a little bit higher if that’s more comfortable. And I put my hand here, on your shoulder.” She laid her arm along the top of his, and rested her hand lightly on his shoulder.

“What about the other hand?”

“We hold hands.” She held out her palm, and he clasped it. “You make a box that I stand in. Stand up straight, as if you’re at attention. Good.” Steve held her stiffly in his arms, as if she were something dangerous. “Steve, not so tight, you’re crushing my fingers. You want to be firm.”

“Sorry, I’m a bit nervous.” She could tell. His palms were sweating.

“That’s alright.” She waited for him to start moving. And waited.

“Now what?”

“We move to the music.” She couldn’t help smiling up at him. “You really don’t know what to do, do you?”

“No ma’am.” He had the most delightfully embarrassed look on his face.

“Well, technically the man is supposed to lead… But since you don’t know how, I guess I’ll have to show you that too.” She smiled up at him. “We need to switch.”

“Switch?” He looked puzzled again.

“Arm positions.” She moved her arm so that hers was under his. “The lead signals where to move on the dance floor, and their partner follows. Now, listen to the music, pay attention to my body, and just follow where I lead.”

Peggy didn’t know what she’d said to make him blush so hard, but he swallowed and said, “Yes ma’am.” Again.

Peggy listened to the music until she found the beat, then took her first steps. Steve only hesitated a fraction of a second before his feet followed where she led. Peggy kept things simple, and didn’t try to cover too much of the dance floor. Keeping to the less populated edges seemed safer. Steve only trod on her feet once, and after he’s stopped apologizing, he seemed to relax a little (as if the worst part was over) and started to trust Peggy not to steer him into another couple on the dance floor.

When the last notes of the song died, Peggy dropped her hands and declared, “Well, I think that’s enough for our first dance lesson.” She wasn’t sure if she could take too much more physical contact with Rogers. She hadn’t realized quite how _masculine_ he was at close quarters.

Steve grabbed her hand before she could walk off the floor. “We can’t sit down, they’re playing our song.”

“Our song?” Peggy asked, bewildered. “Steve, we don’t _have_ a song.”

“When I came in the door, I asked them to play something slow. This is it.”

As the music started to play, he pulled her close. There was no hesitation this time. Steve intended to lead.

They swayed together for a few seconds, then he pulled her in close. Peggy leaned her head against his shoulder. “Where the hell have you been? I was so worried.” She murmured.

He pulled her just a little bit closer, nuzzled her hair, and whispered, “Trying to get back to you.” He felt her relax just a little bit against him, her body going soft inside his arms.

“I thought you were dead.” Her voice cracked.

He lifted one hand and brushed it across her hair. He couldn’t believe he was here with her. “I thought I was dead too.”

“Steve…”

“Shush.” He finally gave into temptation and tipped her chin up with one gentle finger and kissed her. Her lips were warm and receptive against his. She smiled up at him when he pulled back. He sighed happily, smiled at her, and then kissed her again. “I’m here now, and that’s all that matters.”

_Here I go again,_   
_I hear those trumpets blow again,_   
_All aglow again, Taking a chance on love._   
_Here I slide again,_   
_About to take that ride again,_   
_I'm starry eyed again, Taking a chance on love._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just an FYI, I created my character Ozwald Burke back in July, he was fully formed and on the page long before one of my reenactor friends shared the [trailer for Dad’s Army](https://www.facebook.com/universalpicturesuk/videos/1090732874271587/) on Facebook. 
> 
> (I’m sorry, I have no idea which countries can view the trailer outside the United States.)


	5. Epilogue

While Steve Rogers and Peggy Carter stood locked in an embrace, slowly swaying to Benny Goodman’s “Taking a Chance On Love”, far above them two figures stood watching. Dr. Wendy Phillips, senior S.H.I.E.L.D. psychologist, stood next to Agent Natasha Romanov, Level 7 S.H.I.E.L.D. specialist, behind a one-way mirror that hid a small observation room tucked in the upper corner of the massive space.

“It is 2:00 a.m. Agent and I’d rather be in bed. What am I looking at here?” Dr. Phillips asked her companion.

The Black Widow stood perfectly still, arms folded, watching her teammate far below them. “Have you ever heard of a holodeck?”

“You mean like on Star Trek?” Dr. Phillips turned to look at her, incredulously.

Romanov nodded, “Exactly.”

“You’re kidding me.” Dr. Phillips raised her eyebrows, “Where the hell did S.H.I.E.L.D. get a holodeck? We certainly didn’t have one when I went through the Academy.”

“Stark.”

“Figures.” Phillips shook her head, “When did this happen? I don’t remember hearing anything about this…” She waved her hand to indicate the cavernous room below them. “Did I miss the memo?”

“It only happened a couple of weeks ago.” Romanov shrugged. “Cap has been spending a lot of his time reading Wikipedia and watching TV. Trying to get back up to speed on all the things he missed while he was on ice. With the Super Soldier serum, he doesn’t need as much sleep as the rest of us mere mortals. Apparently he was up all night one night watching a Next Gen marathon on the Sci Fi channel. The next morning he asked Tony if holodecks actually existed?

At the time they didn’t.

But we all know that Stark can’t resist a challenge. A week later, Tony had a working prototype ready for us to try out. The team mostly uses it for training exercises. It uses holoprojectors and Life Model Decoys and some of Stark’s bots so that we have something other than each other to practice against. Tony’s still tweaking the software.”

“But this isn’t a training exercise….”

“No, it’s not. And Rogers has been in there every night this week while he thinks the rest of us are sleeping.”

“Doing what, exactly?”

“Pretty much the same thing. The first night he crashed Schmidt’s bomber in the water and spent most of the night in the pool, fully clothed, swimming laps trying to make it to shore. Then he showed up here, still dripping wet, and walked into the scene you’re watching now. The next night he managed to turn the bomber around and crashed it closer to England. One night it was a recreation of the London Blitz with him dodging bombs to get to the club. Most nights he’s fighting one challenge or another. But he always ends up here.” Romanov pointed towards the dance floor below. “With her.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know who the woman is though.”

“I do.” Dr. Phillips sounded thoughtful. “I’ve actually met her once, several years ago. Unless I’m mistaken, and I don’t think I am, that is Agent Peggy Carter, one of the founding members of S.H.I.E.L.D. Back during World War II she was with the Strategic Scientific Reserve, as a liaison with General Phillips, well, he was only a Colonel back then. She worked on Project Rebirth, and was Operations Supervisor for Captain Rogers when he was running missions with the Howling Commandos, what we’d call a handler nowadays. According to everything I’ve heard, they both seemed to have had a bit of a crush on each other, but never acted on it.”

“Hmmm.” Romanov said, “I don’t remember her being part of Stark’s original holodeck programming. I wonder if Steve asked Tony to add her to the program, or if he somehow managed to code this himself. The man’s damned clever by the way. He’s been picking up on technology a lot faster than I would have expected a 95 year old to.”

“Well, technically he’s the equivalent of a college student. He was only in his early twenties when he went into the ice.”

Romanov shrugged. “I was worried about him. So as his shrink, I thought you should know what he’s up to.”

“Thank you Agent Romanov.”

“Is this just nostalgia doc? Or is he practicing so that one day he can lose his title as the 95 year old virgin?”

Dr. Phillips looked down at the blond head bending gently over the brunette one below them. “I have no idea.”

“Professional opinion doc, is Captain Rogers operationally sound?”

“Speak plainly Agent, what exactly do you want to know?”

“Is he a danger to the team?”

“No. Not at all.” Dr Phillips didn’t even hesitate. “Captain Rogers has been handling his transition to modern life much better than anyone could have anticipated. I’ve seen nothing in our sessions to give me any indication that he’s a danger to either himself or his team. In fact, I rather admire the way he’s managed to cope with his,” she waved her hands vaguely searching for the right words, “rather unprecedented situation.”

“So then what’s this all about?” Agent Romanov sounded genuinely curious.

“I have no idea.” Dr. Phillips thought for a moment. What was it Fury had said he thought he’d heard Rogers say when they caught up with him in Times Square? That he’d had a date? A date with Peggy Carter? “It could be the Zeigarnik effect…” She murmured to herself.

“I’m sorry Doctor, what did you say?”

“I was thinking out loud. It could be the Zeigarnik effect. That’s the brain’s natural tendency to remember unfinished things. Sometimes it leads to intrusive thoughts, where you can’t stop thinking about something that you were once pursing, but had to abandon, for example, sometimes it affects athletes who suffered a career ending injury before they’ve reached their goals. I’ve been wondering if Captain Rogers would have any lingering problems because of the way he was yanked out of the war. Being a man out of time, he must have so much unfinished business, so many things that were left unsaid and undone…

There’s a wealth of research on how the brain affects the body. We spend so much of our time daydreaming, fantasizing, and playing out various “What ifs” inside our heads. Captain Rogers didn’t get to let that chapter of his life unfold naturally, the way it should have. I’ve urged him to try journaling or writing fiction as a way of symbolically completing his unfinished business.” She pointed down at the couple still swaying below them. “I suspect that she is unfinished business.”

“Hmmm” Agent Romanov frowned at the couple below them.

“Captain Rogers has been working with me to make sure that his psychology doesn’t affect his work performance. He’s been quite concerned that his old fashioned mental habits might hold him back in the modern world.”

“Other than a reluctance to curse on comms, I haven’t seen anything much different than the rest of the guys on the team.”

“He’ll be happy to hear that. If I may share it with him?” Natasha nodded her assent.

“It’s rather amazing that he’s had the benefit of Stark’s tech to help him write the ending of this particular story. I suspect it was very important for Captain Rogers to be here, in this place, and to be with her.” She nodded to the dark haired woman below them, “I don’t know why, but it was important enough for him to program this simulation. And for him to keep repeating the story and tweaking it until he feels like he’s got it right.

So no, to get back to your question Agent Romanov, I don’t think there’s anything to worry about here. He’s not a danger to himself or anyone else.” Dr. Phillips glanced back through the window at the couple below. “I think perhaps we should give Captain Rogers some privacy now…” She turned and walked towards the door. “I’ll see you next Tuesday Agent? At our usual time?”

“Yes ma’am.” Agent Romanov turned and followed her out the door.

 

 **Epilogue – Peggy**  
Peggy picked up the glass and tossed back the last of the melted ice. It only tasted faintly of the whiskey she’d been nursing all night while she waited. Putting the glass back on the table she made up her mind. Steve wasn’t coming back. She’d been trying to deny it for the past week, but she had to face the facts. He wasn’t ever coming back. She picked up her bag and stood up, turning quickly and walking right into someone behind her.

The man caught her in his arms as they collided. He smelled of whiskey and soap and his arms were strong as they steadied her. “Ohh, I’m sorry Ma’am.” He stepped back, then looked down at her and a shy grin broke out across his familiar face. “Peggy? What are you doing here?”

“Howard, how nice to see you.” She tried not to let the disappointment show in her voice.

One of the club’s camera girls materialized out of the crowd and pointed her camera towards the two of them. “Smile!”

Howard threw an arm around Peggy and they both smiled for the camera. Stark fished a money clip out of his pocket, peeled off a bill and handed it to the girl. “I want two copies of that.”

She smiled and nodded, “Yes sir Mr. Stark.”

“I see they know you here Howard.” Peggy murmured as she tucked her bag back under her elbow. It was long past time for her to be headed home.

“I’ve got a reputation to uphold. It helps if people think of me more as a drunk playboy than as a brilliant arms manufacturer. Less chance of getting kidnapped or killed that way.” Howard murmured back.

“Not to mention all the pretty girls.” Peggy raised her eyebrows at him.

“Oh, I see you’ve been reading the London tabloids?” Howard gave her his most charming smile.

“You’re rather hard to miss.” This time she did let a little disapproval sneak into her voice.

“That’s what I miss about you. You’ve never put up with my nonsense.” Stark hugged her close. “How are you holding up old girl?” he whispered so that no one else could hear.

“Badly.” She whispered, and stepped back. “I’d love to catch up, but I was just about to head home.” She said briskly.

“Well, at the very least, let me escort you to the door my dear.” He tucked her hand under his arm and put his own hand over it. Before she could protest, he started skillfully steering through the crowd, occasionally laughing and waving at someone, as he made a path towards the door.

When they got to the door, he whistled for a cab. He peeled another bill off the roll in his pocket and handed it to the driver. He hugged Peggy again, “I miss him too.” He whispered into her ear. “I’ve bought a ship, we’re leaving tomorrow from Bristol to go search for him. I will bring him home, one way or another.”

“Howard…” Her voice cracked.

“I know kid, I thought he was coming home too.” He squeezed tighter, “I swear to you Peggy, if it is within my power, I will find him.”

 

 **Epilogue – Steve**  
_Here I go again,_  
_I hear those trumpets blow again,_  
_All aglow again, Taking a chance on love._  
_Here I slide again,_  
_About to take that ride again,_  
_I'm starry eyed again, Taking a chance on love._

When the song ended, Steve stepped back and looked down at Peggy and sighed.

“Computer, end program.” The holographic image of the Stork Club dissolved and the Life Model Decoy of Peggy Carter walked itself back to its storage closet. Steve walked over to the control panel and shut down the holoprojectors.

Then he picked up the photo lying next to the controls. It showed Howard Stark, one arm casually thrown around Peggy Carter’s shoulders. They were both smiling for the camera, but Steve knew both of them well enough to know that neither one of them was feeling like smiling when the flashbulb popped. The date scribbled in pencil on the back of the photo was the day he was supposed to have met Peggy at the Stork Club. He would have been jealous of Stark, if it hadn’t been so obvious from the photo that neither of them was having a good time, they were just putting on a smile for the camera.

Even though the photo was black and white, Steve knew Peggy was wearing the same red dress that she’d been wearing that night in the bar, the night he’d formed the Howling Commandos from the remnants of the 107th. He still remembered how Bucky’s jaw had dropped when she walked into the room looking for him. And how, much to Bucky’s dismay, she’d only had eyes for him.

When they’d put all his things in storage after he went missing, someone had tucked the photo into a book in one of the boxes. He’d almost missed it when he’d unpacked, but it had fallen out on the floor while he was moving things from one box to another. He didn’t know if Stark or Peggy had tucked it away for him, but he was grateful for whoever had thought to do it. Other than the faded and water damaged photo of Peggy in his pocket watch, it was the only photo he owned of Peggy Carter.

“Peggy, I wish I’d been able to be there for you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for our date. You will never know how sorry. If I ever manage to find you again, maybe I’ll get a chance to tell you in person just how sorry I am.” He kissed the photo and tucked it safely inside the breast pocket of his uniform jacket. Then he turned out the lights and quietly closed the door on his past.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It was right there in the tags. I _warned_ you this wasn’t a fix it fic.


End file.
